Former Super Eagles Captain, Joseph Yobo, has declared that Nigerian athletes have the capacity to come tops in sports meets if given the right operational environment.
Yobo made the assertion while assessing Nigeria’s performance at the just-concluded Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil in an interview on Monday in Lagos.
The former Norwich City of England FC defender said that Team Nigeria to the Games performed poorly because of shoddy preparations.
According to him, kudos should be given to the football team that performed well and went ahead to win a medal in spite of all the challenges they faced.
He said the inability of sports administrators to prepare early for major competitions was one of the setbacks affecting the growth of sports generally in Nigeria.
“You know that one thing in sports is that you always aspire to do more.
“I want to give kudos to the players and the coaches of the Dream Team VI that represented the country in the football event of the Games.
“I think they did wonderfully well and they indeed represented our country very well,’’ he said urging that they be rewarded bounteously.
“I know they had some issues, there have always been issues in our sports from when I started till when I left the national team, Super Eagles in 2014.
“We have abundant talents but the problem with Nigeria is how to harness these talents to become international stars that will bring pride to us by winning laurels.’’
He said that most countries relied on early preparations to realise their targets at major competitions.
“Currently, I know some people have commenced preparation for the next Olympics having missed out on this one.
“In Nigeria, it is usually the fire brigade approach. We will not start preparing until a few minutes to the competition.
“Without early and good preparation we will get nowhere,’’ he said.
Yobo called on sports administrators to be more committed to developing the various sports in the country by providing the needed facilities and funding.
“We have seen how our talents, especially in the football sector went out of their way to win bronze for the country in spite of all what they went through.
“This shoddy preparations and all other issues can only take persons with dogged commitment and love for the country to go ahead and do this nation proud.
“I think it is time to tell ourselves the truth and do the right things because we cannot continue this way, it is really discouraging,’’ he said.
“We must congratulate, encourage and support our sportsmen and for the sector to grow, we need to do more by reaching out to every department of our sports.
“We must strive to identify raw talents by catching them young, give them time to train together, and let them have an understanding among themselves.
“This is because I believe success does not come over night,’’ he said.
Yobo said that early preparations or planning remained key to the success of sports development and participation.
